When Chip Tate started talking about tequila and mezcal this year, it was easy to assume the man often credited with putting Texas whisky on the map had shifted his attention south of the border for good. The evening he spent back in Waco suggested otherwise. At Red Herring in downtown Waco, Foley Family Wines and Spirits gave guests a first taste of its new lineup, and in a KWTX interview from the event, Tate, the company's Master Distiller for Innovation, talked through a portfolio that still leans heavily on whisky and bourbon.
The station's segment listed Ampersand American Single Malt and Gambit No. 6 bourbon alongside a reposado tequila and a mezcal that Tate distilled hands-on in Mexico. The agave releases have already drawn plenty of attention. The whiskey side of the table is where Tate's longtime fans in Central Texas will want to look first.
A Homecoming With a Different Badge
Waco is not a random stop. Tate founded Balcones in the city in 2008, and the distillery's blue corn whisky and Texas single malt helped turn a small, scrappy operation into one of the most talked-about craft producers in the country. He left Balcones years ago after a well-publicized split, and his return to the city now comes under a much larger banner.
Tate joined Foley Family Wines & Spirits in January 2024. Foley is best known as a family-owned wine and luxury estates group, and its spirits arm gives Tate access to something most independent distillers never get: a deep supply of wine and fortified-wine barrels, plus a Nevada distillery, Minden Mill near Lake Tahoe, where whiskey can rest. In the KWTX segment, he discussed how he got into whisky in the first place and what innovation looks like as a day-to-day job, not just a title.
Gambit No. 6: One Bourbon, Six Barrels
The bourbon on the Waco table was Gambit No. 6, a six-year-old Kentucky straight bourbon that Foley announced on March 30, 2026. The number in its name lines up with the six barrel types used in its finishing: Chardonnay, Cabernet Sauvignon, Apple Brandy, Muscatel, Oloroso Sherry and Tokaji.
How the Finishing Actually Works
The process is more involved than a single extra cask. According to Foley, about 15% of the whiskey spent 19 months finishing in Cabernet Sauvignon barrels made of American oak, sourced from Ferrari-Carano's PreVail Wines. The other roughly 85% spent three months in Chardonnay casks of French oak from Ferrari-Carano. That Chardonnay-finished whiskey was then divided among Oloroso Sherry, Muscatel, Apple Brandy and Tokaji barrels and aged for another 12 to 16 months before everything came back together. The finishing and aging took place at Minden Mill.
The base is a familiar Kentucky profile: a mash bill of 78% corn, 10% rye and 12% malted barley. It is bottled at 92 proof, non-chill-filtered and priced at a suggested $69.99. Foley's tasting notes describe baking spice on the nose and cacao, sweet tobacco and ripe fruit on the palate, and the company suggests it neat, on the rocks or in an Old Fashioned.
Tate framed the project as a long-running interest finally given the resources it needed. In the release announcing the bourbon, he said barrel finishing "has piqued my interest since I started in the whiskey business more than 20 years ago," and that "access to these barrels opens a world of possibilities." He also called it "a testament to the depths of innovation, flavor, and craftsmanship," pointing to what "we can achieve in whiskey making at Foley."
Where to Find It
Gambit No. 6 is sold at retailers in California, Florida, Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, Massachusetts, Nevada, New York, Texas and Washington, and online where shipping is legal. Texas availability matters for the Waco crowd, who no longer need to travel to find it.
Ampersand and the Single Malt Question
The whisky in the Waco lineup carries the Ampersand name, the label Tate launched with Foley in November 2025. KWTX's listing identified it as Ampersand American Single Malt, a notable category for a distiller whose Balcones single malt is still widely cited as one of the bottles that put American single malt on the radar. Production details for a single malt under the Ampersand name were not published in the station's written listing, and Foley's earlier Ampersand announcements did not include a single malt, so drinkers should treat the specifics as still to come.
What is on record is the shape of the Ampersand line so far, which shows how Tate is using the brand: as a place for unusual blends and finishes rather than conventional age statements.
Malus
Ampersand Malus is a 92-proof blend of 51% American rye whiskey and 49% Calvados, each aged eight years. The Calvados comes from at least 40 varieties of apples and pears, distilled in copper Calvados stills and aged in French oak. The first run was 6,000 bottles at a suggested $59.
Vinea
Ampersand Vinea combines 75% eight-year-old rye whiskey with 25% grain spirit made from 100% corn and aged more than nine years in XO Cognac casks. It is also 92 proof and non-chill filtered, with 8,500 bottles produced at $59.
Opimus
Ampersand Opimus is the heavy hitter: a 15-year-old Kentucky bourbon finished in Tokaji casks from the Tokaj region of Hungary, bottled at cask strength of 117 proof. Foley produced 11,500 bottles at a suggested $150.
Tate described the idea behind the collection in Foley's announcement, saying the line "includes unexpected combinations that create something far more intriguing," and added: "The result for each distinct expression is a complex yet harmonious flavor." Foley chief marketing officer Jason Daniel added: "Chip is a visionary talent, and his reputation for flavor and whiskey innovation manifests in Ampersand Spirits."
The Award-Winner Waiting in the Wings
The Ampersand name is also attached to a bourbon that has collected praise before reaching shelves. Ampersand Aureus, a high-rye bourbon distilled at the now-closed Peach Street distillery in Palisade, Colorado, and finished in barrels that once held orange wine that Tate selected in Spain, was named the best American whiskey of 2026 in a Masters spirits competition, according to Forbes coverage. It is bottled at 60.9% ABV, with a suggested price of $75 at release.
Why the Whiskey Side Still Leads
The agave projects are real, and Tate has talked openly about them. "We're just getting started, as I am also spending time in Mexico," he said in the Gambit announcement, "working on developing new distillation techniques for our agave projects." But the lineup poured in Waco makes clear that the whisky and bourbon work is not a side project being wound down.
The Foley setup plays to Tate's strengths. His reputation at Balcones was built on a willingness to treat whisky as a flavor problem to be solved rather than a formula to be followed, whether that meant roasted blue corn or an aggressively flavorful single malt. Gambit No. 6 applies that thinking to a staged, multi-barrel finishing scheme that would be difficult to pull off without a winery's cooperage behind it. Ampersand applies it to blends that cross category lines, from Calvados to Cognac casks to Tokaji.
Reading the Lineup as a Drinker
For anyone deciding where to start, the Foley whiskeys sort neatly by price and ambition. Gambit No. 6, at a suggested $69.99, is the most approachable entry point: a six-year-old bourbon at 92 proof with layered wine and brandy finishes, built to work neat or in an Old Fashioned. Ampersand Malus and Vinea, both at $59 and 92 proof, are the more unusual buys, aimed at drinkers who like the idea of rye meeting Calvados or Cognac-cask grain whiskey. Opimus, at $150 and cask strength, is the splurge.
The Ampersand bottles arrived with competition hardware. Malus earned Double Gold medals at the 2025 TAG Global Spirits Awards and the 2025 Concours d'Spirits, Vinea took a Platinum Award at the 2025 TAG Global Spirits Awards, and Opimus was named Best in Show with 97 points at the 2025 Global Whisky Challenge, North America. Medals are not a substitute for tasting, but they suggest the experiments have landed with judges as well as with fans.
A Common Thread
Across all of these releases, the constant is barrels with a past life. Wine, sherry, Muscatel, apple brandy, Cognac, Tokaji and orange wine casks appear again and again. That is the clearest sign of what Foley's wine roots bring to Tate's whiskey work, and why the whisky and bourbon lineup, not the agave, may be the most distinctive part of what he showed in Waco.
What It Means for Texas Drinkers
For whiskey drinkers in Waco and across Central Texas, the night at Red Herring was a reminder that one of the region's most influential distillers is still making whiskey, just from a different base of operations. Gambit No. 6 is already on Texas shelves. The Ampersand line, including whatever single malt Foley brings forward under that name, gives Tate's longtime followers something to track beyond the tequila and mezcal headlines.
The KWTX segment also covered where to find the new products, a sign that Foley is pushing for local distribution in the city where Tate's career took off. For a distiller whose name still carries weight in Waco, that may be the most meaningful part of the homecoming.
